IT is generally accepted that the speed and extent of learning are directly related to the amount and type of experience undergone by the student. In medicine, in which most experience is necessarily vicarious, areas do exist in which disease simulation can be effected, providing the student with a more direct experience of the disorder under consideration. These include conditions of sensory deprivation, respiratory insufficiency, neurologic and musculoskeletal abnormality and drug effect. This paper describes the use of disease-simulation technics in introducing small groups of third-year medical students to certain aspects of hemiplegia, lower-extremity amputation and rheumatoid arthritis, three conditions . . .